“Mothers have always held such symbolic weight in determining a person's worth. Your mother tongue, your motherland, your mother's values - these things can qualify or disqualify you from attaining myriad American dreams: love, fluency, citizenship, legitimacy, acceptance, success, freedom.”

American writer, poet, and essayist

Jenny Zhang is an American writer, poet, and essayist based in Brooklyn, New York. She is known for work that explores Chinese American immigrant identity and experience in the United States. She has published the poetry collection Dear Jenny, We Are All Find and the nonfiction chapbook Hags. From 2011 to 2014, she wrote extensively for Rookie, and she has also worked as a freelance essayist for other publications. Her short story collection Sour Heart was the first book acquired by Lena Dunham’s Lenny imprint, Lenny Books, through Random House, in 2017.